The names, The names. This novel by Don DeLillo, American writer born of Italian parents emigrated to the States after the First World War (see Wiki Eng; en Wiki), cited as one of the best examples of postmodern American (I read in "Telling the postmodern" of Ceserani. The same critic quoted by Ceserani, and of which, alas, can not remember his name, took such "names" and another novel to bring out the differences between the characteristics of the modern and the post-modern, reduced, finally, to a diversity of questions posed by various authors in their writings. Sorry could not be more specific, but I have the book, and reading time ago), is a novel that revolves around, within, above and below, a cult of which we know nothing, but that the protagonist, James Axton, is determined to discover, understand. A novel intellectual and American, in a sense that you can only imagine reading it. Names. A book that forced me to emphasize this practice I am continuing for another novel, more obsessive and pervasive, and write on the side. Because too many things worthy of being brought to the attention, each page a little thought that triggers something inside. A search of self that you carry and set up the obsessive search for the "cult" and its followers, and his "secret". Secret trite, banal and terrible. Everything leads to death, and only one.
"<<But why kill? >>
<<Nothing less>> he said. <<It must be that. I knew immediately that was it. I can not describe how I penetrated fully and deeply. Not as a question, not an answer. One final thing and terrible. I knew it was right. He must be. Shaking his head, killing him, crushing his brain>>.
[...] A place where men can stop creating history ... [...]
You could say that the structure is intrinsic to the madness. One does not exist without the other>>. "
(P. 242-243)
James Axton is a risk analyst for a large American company, separated from his wife with a son, Tap, lives in Athens, which moves across the Middle East to India, for his work. The stories are set in the late '70s, years not exactly peaceful in that region (as if there had been a quiet, um, there). His wife, Kathryn, works at the archaeological excavations on the Greek island, with her son, and a leader, Owen Brademas, always looking for. Something. On the island, a murder happens. Seemingly inexplicable. But then there are people who worship there, there were seemingly inexplicable killings elsewhere, there are mixed languages, there are letters, there are names.
Ta onoma.
Names.
But that's not worship. That is, the worship is just what triggers the mechanism which starts the player on the road of self. Who is James Axton, at this point in his life. What and what its relationship with the world. With the people around him, other Americans living abroad. With his son Tap, who is writing a novel, and the woman from whom they are separated but not divorced. With women he meets: "A man feels jealousy toward a woman who has never loved, which is only a friend. Do not want to know nothing of the pleasure of the senses. The stories of interest to you at issues of motifs in his life. [...] There is no need to hate someone for complacency of his misfortune. Is not it? No need to love a woman to feel possessive toward you or annoyed by his stories. "(P. 190-191).
Novel written in first person, in which the protagonist goes looking for shots, moving from dialogue to description of a landscape, or gestures of a person who is interacting in that moment (not yet). A glance that wanders, create links, poses continuing questions about himself look like, but also about themselves as language, and of himself as American.
<<All are there, of course, not just the Americans. But the other lacks a certain mythical quality that attracts terrorists. [...] America is the world's living myth. Do not feel guilty for killing an American, to blame America for some local disaster. [...]
In America we kill the wrong way. It is a form of consumerism. It is the logical extension of consumer fantasies. People who shoot from elevated homes barricades. Images pure>>. "(P. 136-137)
And there, the Parthenon, incumbent, who is there, where Axton has not yet gone, but sooner or later will be visiting.
"... The Parthenon was not something to study but to feel. It was not detached, rational, pure and timeless. There could locate the serenity, the logic and sense of stability. It was not a relic of ancient Greece but a part of city living down there. "(P. 380).
De Lillo takes you and takes you into areas you know, but you do not mind you.
There is a dispute between James and Kathryn, great, hard pages.
"The fight was long and detailed, with natural pauses, and moved by road to the terrace, inside the house and finally the roof. It was full of meanness and contempt, the usual forms of domestic assault, the decreases on where you were in agreement. ... Our anger was huge but all that we could show to pull out, they were mumbled, these replicas, and even what we did wrong. ... The dispute had its own life, a force separate from its arguments. ...
<<Bitch. Did you know>>.
<<I tried to find an alternative>>.
<<This means goodbye England>>.
<<We can always go to England>>.
<<You know, I>>.
<<What do you know? >>.
...
<<Loot. I learned to tap>>.
<<I hate this up>>.
<<I always say>>.
<<I am not the man who ... oh, never mind>>.
<<Do not you ever been. Not what you've never been>>.
The dispute had resonance. Levels had, memories. He was referring to other arguments, city, rooms, waste those lessons, our story in a nutshell. [...] Yet this was a desperate love, the conscious, floating, abstract things. It was part of the dispute. It was the same argument.
We went in silence the rest of the trail and she went to see Tap asleep. Then we sat on the terrace and immediately we started to whisper.
<<And where will study? >>
<<Let's start with this? >> "(P. 145-147)
It continues. You can not talk without reading this book without re-reading it. So dense and intense reflection, situations. Psychological thriller, the wikipedia page I linked. Mah Not really. It would be like saying that Oedipus is the first yellow of the story. Simplistic look that unless he lies, however, limited by the object boundaries, in reality, straborda.
Don De Lillo, The Names. To read, if you want to get lost in words.
<<The Sanskrit word for "node," said Emmerich, eventually came to mean "book". Granth. This branch of the manuscripts by birch and palm leaf that were tied to a cord that passed within two holes and stood with nodes>>.
A stern boss, Owen was repeated. His father laughed again because of the huge hat that he wore a vest with his suit. Besides the store at the intersection. The awning and the sign of Coca-Cola. The wooden posts sunk into blocks of ash. His mother always said: <<I do not understand a word of what you are saying>>.
[...]
<<What is a book? "Said Emmerich, is that we open a box. You know this, I suppose>>.
<<What's in the box? >>
<<The Greek word puxos. Boxwood tree. This suggests the wood, of course, and it is interesting that the word "book" in English originates from the Middle Dutch Boek, or birch, and the German boko, birch rod on which were engraved the runes. So, to summarize, we have: book, box, alphabetic symbols carved into the wood. The wooden handle of an ax or knife on which was engraved the name of the owner in runic letters>>.
<<And this is history? >>.
<<No, not history, is exactly the opposite. An alphabet is completely inert. When we read the letters chasing static. This is a logical paradox>>. "(P. 336-337).
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